The state government is responding to concerns about ambulance delays by installing two senior health officers and two police officers at St John headquarters.

Michelle Fyfe, St John CEO has spoken to Oliver Peterson on Perth Live about the changes made by the Health Department, saying that the new policy is ‘no silver bullett’.

“There are ongoing challenges and we recognise those challenges… but we also recognise that we operate in very difficult times,” she said.

“I’ll accept the critism but what I can say is that everything has been done with safety in mind,

“The new implementation is about bringing career firefighters in. In fact I can tell you that 48 of them will be on the frontline on Tuesday,”

Press PLAY to hear the from St John CEO Michelle Fyfe and what the government announcement means for ambulance wait times.

6PR and Nine News Reporter Jake Battrick told Peterson that several procedures are being put in place to help manage paramedic shortages.

“If there’s a significant amount of paramedics isolating, firefighters can step up and drive ambulances with a paramedic on board,” Battrick said.

“We know firefighters are often at incidents where paramedics are required, and they have significant first aid training,

“Expect that to happen sooner rather than later, given there’s still a high caseload in WA.”

The Premier and Health Minister said St John needs high-level assistance to activate its COVID-19 business continuity plan at a press conference earlier.

“We’ve provided additional resources for St John. We had the COVID plan available. They didn’t request the assistance,” Mark McGowan said.

“What we’re now going to do is ensure we have personnel there who can work with St John senior management to get additional resources in when they need it.”

The announcement comes three days after a woman died during a two and a half hour wait for the ambulance she’d called.

Press PLAY to hear a full recap of what the health department announced this afternoon to assist with ambulance wait times.